Veolia Water Technologies South Africa has been re-awarded the operational and chemical water treatment contract for ArcelorMittal South Africa at its Vanderbijlpark steel Works operation.

Veolia has operated the facility’s water-related infrastructure and supplied and managed its chemical dosing requirements since 2014. The awarding of the new contract will see the water treatment specialist operate the plant until 31 October 2021.

ArcelorMittal South Africa Vanderbijlpark Works is one of the largest inland steel mills in the world, consisting of 60 water systems in nine separate site locations. Veolia will manage all the water treatment facilities, including the dosing of approximately 100 tons of Hydrex™ water treatment chemicals per month. These include chemicals for boiler treatment, cooling water treatment, coagulants and flocculants, antiscalants and disinfectants, which are manufactured at Veolia’s new 6 600 m2 Hydrex™ chemical blending facility in Kempton Park.

Unique treatment plant

 ArcelorMittal South Africa, Vanderbijlpark Works, is required to comply with zero effluent discharge (ZED) standards. This is to ensure its economic sustainability and reduce its environmental impact.

 In order to ensure ZED, it requires the treatment of process effluents to a quality suitable for reuse on various plants. Part of the effluent is treated to ultra-pure boiler feed water quality utilising reverse osmosis and CEDI technology while the remainder is recycled to different non-critical cooling circuits and process systems. The build-up of salinity is controlled by two thermal desalination plants.